


Wayward Strangers

by James Ether (badmoonbai), littleblackdressxo



Category: Supernatural, Wayward Sisters (TV)
Genre: OC, Sisters, Spinoff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-18
Updated: 2018-09-19
Packaged: 2019-06-29 05:11:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15722664
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badmoonbai/pseuds/James%20Ether, https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleblackdressxo/pseuds/littleblackdressxo
Summary: The Winchesters brought back a world of people through the rift from the Apocalypse, two of which are sisters Shiloh and Evan. Having grown up with a childhood that startlingly paralleled the Winchesters', the sisters jump into hunting in this new world as strangers while Sam struggles to track down an archangel for his brother's safe return.





	1. Chapter 1

_ She could hear her name being called, her sister’s voice hoarse and desperate but too far to locate precisely; panic rising in her throat, heart beating at a rate too fast to maintain for long. The world around her was tinged with grey, a result of either all of the hope being sucked out of it or almost every living thing having been massacred. ‘God’s Finest’--ha, she hoped she never heard the words ‘guardian angel’ in the same sentence for the rest of her life. _

_ There was the distinct feeling of something over her shoulder, right behind her, but she couldn’t find it in her to turn her head. And still, her name being called, over and over, and she was desperate to answer, but she was gripped with grief, anguish, so much already lost and still so much left to lose, she couldn’t speak out, even for the one thing that kept life worth living--  _

Shiloh woke with a start, tangled in her sheets and covered in a thin layer of sweat. Throwing her blankets off, she quickly sat up, her wild eyes surveying her surroundings. No angels. No destruction. No war. She was safe. She let out the breath she was holding and ran a hand through her hair, unsticking it from her forehead. That’s right, she wasn’t in her world anymore. Sam and Dean Winchester had taken them all through a rift into their world, their non-apocalyptic world. She wasn’t in danger here. Pulling her knees up to her chest, she let her eyes wander around the room, less frantic this time.

Shiloh had been living in the Men of Letters’ secret bunker that Sam and Dean called home for three weeks now. The Men of Letters were a secret society of supernatural experts in this world. They had apparently died out decades before, leaving Sam and Dean as their last living legacies. The bunker, now the Winchesters’ personal home, was a massive underground structure warded against any and all supernatural beings, and filled with research on the same subject. The Winchesters had been playing host to everyone they had pulled from the Apocalypse ever since they had taken care of Lucifer, but the place was so vast that it could hardly be considered cramped.

Her room in the bunker was pretty bare. She didn’t have many personal items to bring with her from her world. None of them did. Lying on the floor next to the bed was her sister, Evan, who was still fast asleep as far as Shiloh could tell. Even though the bunker was massive and had plenty of empty rooms, Evan had insisted they share one. Shiloh had protested at first, eager to finally have her own space after years of living in a camp in the woods with dozens of other people and virtually no privacy. But Shiloh could tell the request meant something more to Evan, so she relented. Evan had volunteered to sleep on the floor and let Shiloh have the bed, and Shiloh hadn’t hesitated to take her up on it. It had been so long since she had slept on anything more than a rundown mattress on a dirt floor, she couldn’t wait to sleep in a real bed again. 

Deciding she wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep, Shiloh quietly climbed out of bed. It was early. Too early to wake Evan up, but Shiloh usually woke up hours before her anyway. She grabbed a change of clothes and headed for the showers.

Shiloh walked into the bunker’s communal bathroom and into one of the shower stalls. She turned the water on as hot as it would go, stripped out of her sweat-soaked pajamas, and stepped under the spray of water. The bunker had amazing water pressure, which Shiloh appreciated greatly. For the past eight years she had been bathing sporadically in a river close to camp, so she had practically burst into tears when she saw the showers in the bunker for the first time. She let the hot water run down her body, washing away last night’s memories of her post-apocalyptic world.

Once she was showered and dressed, Shiloh started to head towards the kitchen for some coffee. The bunker was silent as most people were still asleep. It was one of the reasons Shiloh liked to wake up early, to enjoy the peace and quiet. Their camp back home had always been loud and busy, with people up at all hours of the day preparing for the next mission or angel attack. Even the bunker would be hectic during the day, with thirty-plus people living in one space together. But now, in the early hours of the day, everything was quiet and still. Well, mostly. 

As Shiloh passed through the library, she noticed Sam sitting at one of the tables, staring down at a plethora of open books with the intensity of someone trying to stay awake; there were dark circles around his eyes. As she walked into the kitchen and put a coffee pot on, Shiloh thought about how bad she felt for Sam. It had been about three weeks since Lucifer was killed and Dean was taken by Michael. She almost couldn’t believe it. The archangel Lucifer,  _ the _ Lucifer from this earth, was dead. When Lucifer had come over to their earth with Sam and Dean, Shiloh had been understandably shocked. Their Lucifer had been dead for years, killed in the battle with the archangel Michael that destroyed their earth, and its not like Shiloh had ever met him anyway. It had been a little daunting meeting the Devil face-to-face, even if it wasn’t  _ their _ Devil. And from what she had heard, he lived up to his terrible reputation. Shiloh had only spoke to Sam a little bit, but she knew he had been tortured by Lucifer a while back. She couldn’t imagine how it must have felt to finally kill the asshole that had caused him so much pain, to be so close to finally being at peace, only to lose his brother a minute later.

Shiloh remembered the relief she felt when she stepped through the rift that connected her world to the Winchesters’ and into the bunker. No more fighting. No more dying. They were finally safe. Shiloh’s family had never been overtly religious, but she had known as most people did that the word “apocalypse” meant the complete and utter destruction of the world as it was known. If one had ever read the Book of Revelations, they would know the apocalypse would be caused by an all-out war between the archangels Michael and Lucifer. Most people never believed it would actually happen. On their earth, most people had been wrong. Michael and Lucifer had fought, and Michael had won. Good, right? Wrong again. As was prophesied, the war had taken its toll, scarring the earth and killing billions of people. And instead of protecting the people that were left, Michael decided to try and kill them too, leading to a war between angels and humans that Shiloh had been a part of for the last twelve years. A war that they were losing, before the Winchesters came over through the rift and saved them. Michael coming through to this world had shaken her a bit, but he had disappeared (along with Dean) quickly enough and she still felt relatively safe in the bunker. She was happy to not be fighting for once in her life. To not have to worry about where her next meal would come from (she had no idea where Sam and Dean got the money to buy food for thirty people but she didn’t ask). To sleep through the night without being woken up by sirens or screams. She was happy to be safe.

Shiloh did feel guilty about what that her safety had cost. Michael running off with Dean as his vessel was definitely not part of any plan they had made. All angels needed a human vessel, a human body for their spirit to occupy, in order to walk on earth. None of them had even known Dean was Michael’s ideal vessel (as Sam was Lucifer’s) until after it all went down. Shiloh wondered if they would have risked coming over here with the Winchesters had they known. It wasn’t fair that Sam and Dean had to suffer to keep the rest of them safe. After all, they were from a different world, an alternate universe. Sam and Dean didn’t owe them anything. And yet here they were, enjoying the comfort of their world while Dean was out God only knows where (actually, did God know? Had anyone asked? Someone should probably ask...) with Michael.

Shiloh couldn’t even imagine going through Sam’s current predicament, losing his brother like that. Evan had been by her side all her life. If she disappeared, Shiloh would go out of her mind trying to find her. 

As if she had heard Shiloh thinking about her, Evan shuffled into the kitchen, still looking half-asleep--her blonde hair was tousled in the back, her blue eyes heavy with sleep. 

“G’morning,” Evan mumbled.

“Good morning sleepy head. You’re up early,” Shiloh teased, pouring her sister a cup of coffee and holding it out for her. 

Evan grumbled, unamused, but gratefully took the coffee anyway. “Heard you get up. Couldn’t fall back asleep,” she mumbled into her mug. 

Shiloh inwardly cursed herself for being so inconsiderate. “Sorry,” she said.

“‘S’okay,” Evan said, blinking herself awake, “Might as well get a jump on this research anyway.”

Shiloh felt bad. Everyone had been pouring over all the books in the bunker for the last three weeks trying to find a way to track down Michael/Dean, with little success so far. She knew Evan wanted to help find Dean, but she also knew her sister was going stir crazy being cooped up like this. 

“It doesn’t look like Sam got any sleep last night,” Shiloh commented, genuinely worried for the man’s well-being. This wasn’t the first time he had pulled an all-nighter since Michael/Dean fell off the radar, and Shiloh knew from personal experience that going days without sleep wasn’t good for a person. 

“Can you blame him?”  Evan said.

No, she couldn’t. “He’s not going to be any help to Dean if he’s exhausted,” Shiloh said.

“He’s not going to be able to help Dean if we can’t find Michael and kill him,” Evan said. Shiloh hummed in response. They had been trying to kill Michael for so long, it almost seemed impossible. “Now come on. Let’s go read more books!” Evan cheered, tired voice dripping with sarcasm.

 

~~

 

Evan sat at one of the tables in the library across from Shiloh and Sam, various books scattered all around them. Castiel, the Winchester’s resident angel, sat on her right in his standard navy tie and tan trench coat (Did he ever change clothes?). Mary Winchester sat at the table next to theirs with Bobby Singer, who was their fearless leader in the war against the angels and like an uncle to Evan and Shiloh. He had taught them practically everything they knew about hunting, and they certainly wouldn’t be alive today if not for him. Other members of their rebel group that came through the rift sat scattered around the library, everyone intent on finding a way to track down Michael/Dean. 

Jack sat at a table in the corner, and Evan eyed him warily. She couldn’t get a read on him. Despite being the literal spawn of Satan, he seemed innocent enough. The event of his birth had opened the inter-dimensional rift that allowed Sam and Dean to find them and save them. Jack had even been helping their people fight Michael and his army for the past couple of months, and Evan supposed she should be grateful. Which she was, sort of. But he was still a nephilim, a part-angel, and Evan had been dealing with angels long enough to know that they cause more problems than they solve.

Castiel seemed nice enough, and Gabriel had seemed like a good guy (he  _ had _ sacrificed himself so that everyone could escape through the rift, after all). But Lucifer had been a grade-A asshole, seeing as he was the reason Michael had been able come over to this world and taken Dean in the first place. Evan wondered how much Jack took after Lucifer. From the looks of him right now, she would guess not much. He was slumped in his chair, solemnly reading a book Evan was pretty sure he had already gone through yesterday. She did feel a bit sad for him. Lucifer had lied to him and stolen some of his Grace. He had to watch Dean kill his father and then watch helplessly as Michael kidnapped Dean. Evan knew Jack cared deeply for his family, so she knew it must have been difficult for him to go through all of that and be powerless to stop it. Evan almost wished she could comfort him, but she didn’t know how. Angels destroy everything you care about, she could have told him that from the beginning. And honestly, she was still a little pissed Jack hadn’t just killed Lucifer when they first met. She would have. It would have saved them all a lot of trouble. 

Evan slouched further in her chair, her eyes skimming over the words in the book she was holding without really reading them. Fuck, she was tired. She had stayed up pretty late last night, as per usual. She was hoping to sleep in a little, but then she heard Shiloh wake up at o’dark thirty. It’s her own damn fault though. It’s not like she had to sleep in the same room as Shiloh. She was pretty sure there was still an empty room or two in the bunker. But for the past eight years Evan had slept no more than five feet away from her sister, and even in this safe new world, even in this secure bunker, that wasn’t going to change. And if that meant being woken up before the sun by one of Shiloh’s nightmares, then so be it.

Evan had been taking care of her sister since they were young, which included helping her fall back asleep after she had a nightmare. And when you lived in the hellscape they had lived in, nightmares were common. Evan could sleep like the dead, but any small whimper, mumble, or gasp from her sister could wake her up in an instant. Evan was always there to comfort Shiloh and rub her back until she fell back asleep. Not that she had done that in a while. She stopped consoling her sister about her nightmares when moody-teenager-Shiloh had insisted on it, but she still woke up nonetheless. Granted, the nightmares had decreased slightly as they got older. In fact, it had been months since now twenty-two year old Shiloh had a nightmare, until they made it to the bunker. She had had a couple since they had arrived in this world, but Evan chalked that up to her finally being able to take a minute and process everything. 

The last couple of months had been crazy over in their world. With the rifts opening up, Mary and Jack helping out, some guy named Ketch working with Charlie, it felt like everything had just exploded. It almost felt like they might win their war with the angels there for a second. And then Sam and Dean showed up and offered to take everyone through the rift into their world. Man, had that shaken things up. One minute they were preparing to fight, the next they were packing up and getting the hell out of dodge. Evan had almost protested, not liking the idea of running away and leaving their world to burn at the hands of Michael and the angels. But then she saw the look in Shiloh’s eyes, the hope she had that they might actually live another day, and she couldn’t say no to that. So they grabbed what little personal belongings they had, sent a quick message to Declan, and headed on out.

Declan. Evan shifted in her chair as she thought about her brother. Declan was a few years older than Evan, at twenty-six herself, and he was technically only their half-brother. He was the kid left over from their mom’s first marriage, and he had pretty much stayed with his father, only visiting them for holidays and long-weekends. He looked nothing like their mom with his dark curls and excitable eyes, but he acted exactly like her. He was ambitious and stubborn and loyal. He and Evan got along well, and he loved messing around with Shiloh, always knowing exactly how to piss her off. Even though as kids they rarely saw him, they loved having him around. Evan and Shiloh always hoped that one day Declan would come and live with them. Which he did, eventually, but not in the way that they wanted.           

Declan’s father had died shortly after the Angel War broke out. The Declan that came to live with them after that wasn’t the same one they had grown up with. He was quiet and withdrawn and angry. He pretty much stopped talking to their mother, blaming her for not being there when his father died. But he remained close with the girls, although in a more protective-older-brother way. They wouldn’t be alive today if it wasn’t for him.

Evan shifted in her seat again and tried to focus back on the book she was supposed to be reading. It was yet another book on archangels. She was pretty sure Sam had already read through this one, but it didn’t hurt to check through it again. In the state he was in, there was a good chance Sam might have missed something. Not that she could blame him for acting the way he was. She glanced over at him. Evan had some firsthand experience with dirty laundry and could roughly estimate his wrinkled flannel was going on its fifth day worn and unwashed. He had pulled his hair back at some point the night before when Shiloh had made a good-natured joke about how unkempt it looked, but now the grease was visible at the roots from days without showering; Evan could see the page he was holding between his fingers was quivering as his hand shook from exhaustion, and when she glanced at his face she saw his dark-rimmed eyes were staring at the same spot on the page, unblinking; it was all very uncharacteristic. In truth, he looked like shit, but that was to be expected considering all he was going through. Evan couldn’t see herself looking any different if it were her in his position. 

For the past three weeks, Evan had been thinking a lot about what she would do if Shiloh went missing. In terms of specific scenarios, that is. No matter what, she knew the first step would be to lose her goddamn mind. Evan had been protecting her sister since she was born. She had done a good job so far, and she would do anything to protect that perfect record. Which had gotten her in some trouble from time to time. Evan had taken a knife or a bullet for her sister on more than one occasion, and had the scars to prove it. She had even thrown a mission or two in favor of protecting her sister, about which Bobby had been none too pleased. But she didn’t care. Nothing mattered more than keeping Shiloh safe.

Evan heard a chair scrape against the floor and looked up to see Mary stand up to grab another book off the shelf they were all currently working their way through. As Mary walked past Sam, she casually patted his shoulder. Sam looked up at her and gave a half-smile, patting her hand in return.

Evan felt a pang of sadness go through her. Sam and Dean were lucky. They had managed to get their mom back after she had been dead for over thirty years. Evan had heard through the grapevine back at camp that God’s sister had apparently brought Mary back as a way to thank Dean for reuniting her with their brother. Apart from the surprise of finding out God had a sister (Amara, Evan thought her name was), Evan couldn’t help but wish something similar could happen to her. Evan still remembered watching her parents die, that feeling she got, that grief and anger that hollowed out into an emptiness she had still yet to get rid of. She would give anything to have her parents back.

Almost unconsciously, Evan reached her hand up to touch the ring hanging around her neck—her mother’s wedding band. It was one of the very few reminders she had left of her parents. Shiloh had her father’s wedding band hanging similarly from her neck. They hadn’t been able to take anything else with them, and she would sooner die than part with her mother’s ring. 

Suddenly, Sam’s phone went off, and Evan snapped back to reality. Sam glanced at his phone, the urgency to his expression was likely in anticipation of a text from Dean. Apparently not seeing what he had hoped for, Sam promptly turned his attention back to his laptop. Evan glanced at the phone as well, and saw the screen light up with several missed notifications. She rolled her eyes.

This had been happening for the past couple of weeks. Sam’s phone would go off a few times a day, and every time he would ignore it. It hadn’t really bothered her at first, Sam hadn’t seemed concerned so why should she be, but now she was starting to get curious. They didn’t have phones in their dimension (no need when the majority of the population is dead), so she wasn’t sure if this behavior was normal or not. She just didn’t know when the right time to ask Sam about it would be. Thankfully, an opportunity presented itself not five minutes later when his phone went off again.

“Okay, what is that?” Evan asked, breaking the concentrated silence in the room. Everyone looked up from the books they were reading, and Sam gave her a confused look. “That,” Evan specified, nodding her head towards the phone, “Your phone. Why is it doing that?”

“It’s nothing,” Sam brushed off.

“Well, ‘nothing’ is happening every couple of hours and it’s starting to get annoying,” Evan said.

“Ev,” Shiloh said in a warning tone, regarding her bluntness.

“It’s fine, I’ll put it away,” Sam said, moving to grab the phone off the table.

“Sam,” Castiel said, making Sam pause, “You should tell them. We can’t ignore this forever.”

Sam and Castiel shared a look before Sam sighed, running a hand through his hair and shifting into a position where he could address everyone. 

“Alright look, I didn’t want to tell you guys this because I didn’t want you to worry, but the world,  _ this  _ world, has kind of gone to shit ever since Lucifer died,” Sam said.

“What do you mean?” Evan asked, already not liking where this was going.

“Ever since Lucifer died, and Michael came over into this world, there has been a major increase in supernatural activity. Monsters, ghosts, demons, all of it. That’s what all of these are,” Sam said, holding up his phone, “They’re alerts to possible cases around the country.”

“Aren’t there other hunters out there, you know, hunting?” Shiloh asked. Monster hunters were a commonality between their two worlds as far as they knew. 

“There are, but only a few. Not nearly enough to deal with everything that’s going on out there,” Sam said. 

They all sat in stunned silence, taking in the information they were just given.

“So what, you’re just going to ignore all of those?” Evan asked, “Pretend it's not happening?”

“I’m not ignoring them,” Sam snapped, “I just… I need to find Dean first. We need to get rid of Michael. Then we can deal with everything else.”

Evan felt a pang of guilt. It felt they had just brought over all of their problems to this earth.

“I don’t understand, is Michael the one causing all of this?” Shiloh asked.

“No. I mean, maybe a little. The truth is it's hard to tell,” Sam said.

Just then something clicked. “The archangels,” Evan said, causing everyone to look at her, “There are no more archangels on your earth. I mean, Lucifer is gone, Gabriel is gone, Michael is MIA. Hell,  _ God  _ is MIA. There’s no one left to control hell’s foot soldiers. No… supernatural hierarchy to keep things in check.” Sam nodded, confirming her theory. 

“There aren’t enough angels to maintain order,” Castiel added, “And with no more archangels, heaven is losing power fast.”

“So all the monsters and demons are running wild,” Shiloh said.

“The ghosts too. The reapers seemed to have jumped ship and, like Cas said, Heaven is losing power fast,” Sam said.

Everyone sat quietly, unsure of how to respond. 

“Well,” Evan finally said, “Why don’t we do something?”

“I told you, we need to find Dean first,” Sam said.

“No,  _ you  _ need to find Dean first. But the rest of us could be out there helping,” Evan said, “You have an entire bunker full of hunters here, not to mention Charlie, Rowena, and Ketch out there somewhere. Use us.”

Everyone paused, considering the idea.

“No-”

“Are you insane?”

Sam and Bobby spoke at the same time.

“I think it's a good idea,” Mary said.

“What? No,” Sam said to his mom, then turned back to Evan, “This isn’t your world. This isn’t your fight, it's not your responsibility.”

“Sam is right, we don’t really know anything about this world. Who knows how dangerous it is out there for us,” Bobby said.

“Monsters are monsters no matter what version of earth you’re on,” Evan argued, “Just tell me how to kill them and I will.”

“Evan, Bobby is right. We don’t know what’s out there,” Shiloh said.

“So? We managed to survive on our hellscape of a planet, I’m sure we can handle anything on this one,” Evan said, a little surprised Shiloh didn’t agree with her.

“We brought you all over here to be safe. Not to throw you out into our world and ask you to risk your lives again,” Sam said.

“First off, you’re not asking. We’re volunteering,” Evan said, “And second, this is all happening because of us. Michael is here because of us. Gabriel died saving us. This whole thing started in the first place because you guys opened a rift into our world, and now our problems are becoming your problems.” Evan paused to look Sam in the eye. “You guys risked your lives for us and you didn’t even know us. Now it’s our turn to do the same.”

Sam paused for a moment, considering. “Bobby is right, this world is different from your world. The monsters here might not behave the way they do over there,” he said finally.

“It’s not that different,” Mary said, “If anything, our monsters might be a little easier to kill. They haven’t had to evolve to survive in an apocalyptic wasteland yet. And besides, if they have any questions, they can always call me or Bobby. Everything they need to know is in this bunker.”

“I could go with them,” Jack offered, speaking up from the corner of the room and startling those around him. “I know my way around both worlds well enough.”

Evan hesitated. She didn’t want to be responsible for babysitting him, but  she supposed he would be handy to have in a fight. “Yeah, he could be like our interdimensional translator,” Evan said, not meeting Jack’s eyes.

“It  _ would  _ help if we had more hunters out there,” Castiel mumbled to Sam.

“Yeah, the more eyes you have out there, the better our chances are of finding Dean,” Evan said, knowing that would be the argument to sway Sam to her side.

Sam took a moment to look around the room, and Evan did the same. She had been pitching this idea without really seeing if anyone else was on board. It looked like most of them were, though Shiloh looked oddly hesitant. Evan would talk to her later.

Finally, Sam sighed, sitting back in his chair. “Alright, if you guys are really okay with this, then go ahead,” he said.

 

~~

 

Shiloh sat on her bed, still reeling from what just took place in the library. Evan had told her to go and start packing her things, but Shiloh couldn’t bring herself to move. She was unbelievably angry that Evan was so willing to sacrifice the stability they had finally found for a world they didn’t belong in. They had no idea what this dimension was like, how the monsters compared to their own. Shiloh understood that Evan wanted to help, and she did too. But they had a purpose in the bunker and, for the first time in a very long time, they were safe.

“Hey,” Evan said, walking into their room. She stopped short when she saw Shiloh sitting on the bed. “What’s up? Why aren’t you packing?” 

“I just-” 

“Come on, we still have to grab all of our weapons and everything. Sam said we could raid the armory,” Evan said, sounding excited. She started moving around the room, grabbing what little clothes she had out of the dresser and throwing them in her bag.

“Evan, stop. Just-” Shiloh took a deep breath, “Are we really doing this? I mean, Sam is right. This isn’t our world. We don’t have to go out there.”

“What do you mean, of course we have to go out there,” Evan said, “We can’t just let this world go to shit like ours.”

“Yeah, but this world is pretty far from being anywhere near as bad as ours,” Shiloh said. It was true. The majority of this world’s population was still alive. The earth was still green. Angels weren’t raining down left and right killing everyone.

“Yeah, for now. We have the chance to stop it before it gets that bad,” Evan said. She stopped what she was doing for a second and looked at Shiloh. “What’s going on, I thought you would be excited to get out of this bunker? I sure-as-fuck am.”

“Yeah, I am, it's just…,” Shiloh paused, trying to keep the frustration out of her voice, “I just think we could be more useful here. Trying to find a way to track Michael. You know, so we can kill him and finally go home.”

“Come on, Shi, we’ve been through those books like a thousand times. We’re getting nowhere. Besides, it’ll be good to have eyes on the ground actually _ looking _ for Michael,” Evan said.

“Oh come on, you don’t actually think we’re just going to run into Michael at a Stop n’ Shop, do you?” Shiloh said.

“Maybe,” Evan said with a shrug, obviously trying to be obstinate. Shiloh rolled her eyes. “Now get a move on,” Evan said, resuming her packing.

Shiloh took a deep breath, throwing her final Hail Mary. “Ev... don’t you want to try to find a way to get back to Declan?” She said. 

Evan faltered.  _ Bingo. _ Shiloh knew it was kind of a dick move to bring up their brother, but he never failed to pull Evan’s heartstrings. 

“I mean, we kinda just left him there-” Shiloh started, but Evan quickly cut her off.

“We didn’t leave him there,” Evan said harshly, spinning around to face her, “We had to go. Declan was on the other side of the country, there was no way he was going to make it to the rift in time before it closed.”

It was true. Their brother was heading towards another group of rebels in the area that used to be southern California. It would have taken him days to get back to them.

“Declan would have wanted us to take this opportunity, to be safe,” Evan said, more to herself than to Shiloh, “We sent him a message. He knows what we’re doing. He would have done the same thing.”

“If he were here, he would be doing everything he could to find a way to kill Michael, to get home to us,” Shiloh argued.

“If he were here, he would be doing the same thing we are! Going out there, protecting people. He would never just sit around and let innocent people die,” Evan said.

Shiloh sighed. As much as she hated to admit it, she knew it was true. 

“What is going on with you? You’ve never hesitated to go into a fight before,” Evan said.

“Ev… I’m tired, okay?” Shiloh sighed, suddenly seeming to cave into herself. “I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of almost dying every day. I’m tired of worrying about you and everyone else, wondering if today’s the day one of us doesn’t make it home.”

Evan stood frozen, surprised by Shiloh’s transparency. Shiloh almost never talked so openly about her distaste for hunting. There was never any point, it’s not like they could have changed the world they used to live in. Monsters existed, and if you wanted to live you had to fight them, it was as simple as that. But Shiloh was only ten when the apocalypse took place, and she often felt like her childhood had been stolen from her since every day after that had been consumed with the fight to survive.

Evan softened then, moving to sit next to Shiloh on the bed. “Look, I get that you’re tired. I am too. We all are. But this--” Evan gestured around the room in a way meant to refer to the entire dimension, “--was never going to be the end for us. Even after we defeat Michael, even after we go home, there’s still going to be a lot of work to do. All of the angels will still be there. The fight isn’t over. And even after that, were still going to have to rebuild. It’s not going to be easy getting the world back to the way it was,” Evan said.

Shiloh despised the truth in her sister’s words. However, it was not the first time she had thought about how life would carry on if the war were to end on the humans’ terms, and she was willing to put in the work when they came to that bridge. But the weeks of quiet research in the bunker had been like a small taste of a forbidden fruit that she couldn’t rinse out of her mouth. 

“Hey,” Evan said, grabbing her hands to get her attention, “We still have each other. It might not be easy, but we’re going to go through it together. Like always.”

Shiloh smiled at that. Despite her hardened demeanor, Evan could prove really sentimental when the mood struck. And it never failed to win Shiloh over.

“So, are we good?” Evan asked.

“Yeah,” Shiloh said, still wary but much less so, “We’re good.”

“Good. Now, get packing,” Evan said, standing up. She grabbed her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and headed for the door. “Oh!” Evan said, turning back to her, “Do me a favor and track Jack down. He seemed a little quiet earlier and I want to make sure he’s cool with all of this.”


	2. Chapter 2

Shiloh knocked hesitantly on Jack’s bedroom door and waited for him to invite her in, but instead he opened the door almost instantly so that she almost fell into the room. “Hey,” she recovered, straightening up.

“Hey,” he replied, watching her regain her composure. The two looked at each other in silence for a moment before Shiloh crossed her arms in front of her chest and held her elbows close.

“Ev sent me to check on you. You were kind of quiet in the library today.”

“Evan cares that I was quiet?” Jack said with a kind of coldness Shiloh hadn’t heard from him before.

“Uh… yeah,” she said, following him through the doorway and watching him sit on the edge of his bed. She wasn’t entirely sure how to respond to his sudden defensiveness. Her eyes wandered awkwardly--she noticed a Star Wars poster tacked on the wall, a stack of cassette tapes labeled with masking tape on the nightstand, a paperback novel open and placed facedown on his pillow. She resisted the urge to smile at how delicately homey the sparse room was. “Everything okay?” she tried, trying to warm him up.

“Your sister isn’t fond of me, is she?” Jack asked.

Shiloh respected his outright bluntness. She knew that as a newborn part-angel his communication skills were still developing and he had a tendency to call things as they were.

“Not… entirely--she’s just wary,” she added when Jack’s head swung up to face her. His expression was pained, and Sam had previously mentioned to her how much guilt Jack carried for nothing more than his own identity, something inherent, something he couldn’t help. Shiloh moved to sit beside him on the bed. “In our dimension… the angels did a lot of harm. It's hard to forget all of the shit that went on over there. It’s not that she doesn’t trust  _ you _ , she just… doesn’t know who to trust anymore.”

Jack was quiet, staring at his hands clasped between his knees. “She trusts you.”

“Well, yeah… I’m her sister.”

“She trusts Sam. And Dean.”

“I think… I think she sees a lot of us in them. It's hard for her not to trust someone who has only good intentions for their family. Sam’s pretty much been searching tirelessly for Dean since we’ve gotten here.”

“And I’m just the reason Michael has Dean in the first place,” Jack said bitterly.

“What? No,” Shiloh said in surprise, “Everything that happened was because of Lucifer. We know none of that is your fault.”

“I should have killed Lucifer when I had the chance. If I had none of this would have happened,” Jack said. 

“Jack, none of us blame you for not wanting to kill your father. Not even Evan,” Shiloh said.

Jack had no reply. Shiloh felt her heart grow heavy--after all, she knew a thing or two about judgement for things beyond her control.

“She’ll come around, Jack. She saw what you did for our world. She knows the Winchesters consider you family.”

Jack blinked. “Do you consider me family, Shiloh?”

Shiloh softened at his use of her name--it was a personal question, dripping with the need for acceptance, her acceptance.

“I just… we just met you, Jack. I think it takes a little bit more to feel that kind of connection with somebody,” she said, and before his face could fall she added, “But I’m extremely grateful for everything you’ve done for us. I’m excited to work alongside you. Honest.”

Jack’s eyes were downcast again. “I just know all of this is my fault. None of this would have happened if I’d just been able to stop Michael to begin with. Or better yet, if I’d never even been born. The rift never would have opened in the first place.”

Shiloh looked at him hard. “Jack, if you’d never been born, you never could have saved us from the hell our dimension had become. Don’t think you haven’t done some good in your time on this earth. And even the bad, accidental or not, mistakes are part of what makes us human. And if you ask me, the human in you is a lot more powerful than the angel.”

Shiloh reached over and took his hand in hers, hoping desperately she wasn’t overstepping any boundaries. She didn’t have a whole lot of practice talking people down emotionally--Evan tended to shut her down whenever she tried.

“None of this is your fault, Jack.”

At this, Jack finally met her eyes, slowly, timidly.

“Come with us. Take this chance to do some more good. Change the world for the better. Evan will come around--in the meantime, just do right by others.”

A soft smile was just beginning to play on his lips. Shiloh felt his fingers twitch slightly, almost as if he were yearning to squeeze her hand in thanks. Jack would be an asset--she could already tell.

 

~~

 

Jack watched Shiloh disappear around the corner and retreated back into his room to finish packing. He hoped there was at least some truth to the things she had said to him, that they weren’t just empty words to try and make him feel better.

Jack knew full well, deep down, that much of the world’s problems at the moment, hell much of  _ another _ world’s problems for that matter, were in some way related to him--his birth, his mere existence. Shiloh was new to the team, so it was only natural that she not be fully up to speed on the situation--not yet, at least. She would be soon. Someone would let slip how much of a burden he was, all the trouble he caused, and she would become just as wary as Evan.

_ Evan _ . Her name itself meant a ‘gracious gift from God’. It was no wonder she didn’t trust him. He had come directly from literal Satan.

_ “Evan will come around” _ , Shiloh had said. She had said it with such conviction, so much confidence--but what if nothing Jack did was enough to convince her of his worth? That was how many things seemed to be going these days.

Jack stuffed a spare pair of boots into his bag and turned back around to his chest of drawers to grab one last handful of shirts when he stopped short. He slowly raised the jacket on top to eye-level--brown suede, double chest pocket, outdated 1970s southwestern-patterned shoulders--and a brief but haunting memory of pushing a well-meaning sherriff into a vending machine and knocking her out cold while her son rushed to her aid.

_ In the meantime, just do right by others. _ There were so many wrongs to right. Jack felt them weighing on his heart like a cosmic entity. He needed a fresh start, a way to wipe the slate clean. Obviously, doing away with himself wasn’t an option--he’d tried that already without much luck. On top of that, he didn’t think he could forgive himself for dragging a destructive archangel from another dimension to wreak havoc on this one and then abandoning everyone to deal with the aftermath.

Small steps. That’s what he had to do. There was no way to fix everything all at once--there was too much. One thing at a time, working his way up to the bigger issue of Michael and Dean. His uncle and his brother.

His first task, he thought to himself, would be to show Evan his value. To prove to her that she could trust him, all of him, including his angel-half, just as he had done with Dean.

_ If you ask me, the human in you is a lot more powerful than the angel. _ No one had ever said that to him before. He’d always felt like the angel in him was a tool, what made him worth keeping around--he may have inherited it from Lucifer, but it was all he had to fight the evil Sam and Dean were always up against. Without it, he was weak. But Shiloh may have had a point. Humanity makes a person willful, determined, strong. Because he was human, he understood love and pain like his father never could, like Michael never could. It gave him a power beyond anything they were capable of.

Jack folded the jacket in his hands and carried it over to his bag, placing it inside with care. He was done carrying around symbols of his failures and insecurities. If he was going to make a difference, in this dimension and the next, it was time he made a change in himself.

 

~~

 

Evan found her way to the elevator and hopped inside, pushing the button to the floor the armory was located on. Before she had left the library to pack, Sam had pulled her aside and handed her a set of keys, telling her to swing by the armory and stock up on any supplies she might need. Evan had nodded, trying to keep her face blank and professional, but inside she had been stoked. The Winchesters had told the group of rebels before they went through the rift that their world would be safe for them and they wouldn’t need to bring that many weapons. Evan herself had only brought over her knife that she kept tucked in her boot and her gun tucked in her belt. And honestly, she didn’t have much more she could have brought with her. The rebels had been running low on supplies lately, and the weapons they did have were pretty old so there was no point in bringing them along. Evan had unconsciously brought her knife over with her, so used to keeping one in her boot that she had forgotten it was there all together. Her gun on the other hand, bringing that over had been intentional. It was the first gun she had ever had. Bobby had given it to her before she went out on her first hunt at the ripe old age of fifteen, and she had managed to keep it with her all these years. 

As the elevator began to descend, Evan let her mind wander back to Jack. Evan decided she was glad he was coming with them, despite the fact that he would be another thing she would have to keep an eye on. Evan knew Jack was only at about half-power right now after Lucifer had stolen his Grace, and it would be a while before he got back to full-power. Which meant that Evan would have to watch out for him and make sure he didn’t get in over his head or too seriously hurt. But she had had plenty of practice doing that with Shiloh already, what was one more kid to add to the list. That’s what Jack was, a kid. He had only been born a couple of months ago and had simply aged himself up to make himself look older. Jack mostly acted the age that he looked (somewhere in his early twenties, Evan guessed), but the innocent naivety of his newborn brain would show itself occasionally. He had such a pure desire to protect people and such an optimistic outlook on things. Sometimes it annoyed Evan, but most of the time she welcomed it. Hope had long been dead on her earth, and it had been nice to have someone around to lift everyone’s spirits. Evan supposed that was part of the reason she was letting Jack come with them.

The other part was purely from an objective standpoint. Jack knew this earth, at least a little. He had only been on this earth for a couple of months before he had come through he rift into their world. Evan still remembered seeing Jack and Mary at their camp for the first time. They had wandered in covered in dirt and dried blood, talking about how they had escaped from Michael’s headquarters and needed a place to lay low for a while until they could figure out how to make it back to their earth. The sight of Mary had thrown Bobby a little, as the Mary Winchester on their earth had been dead for years. Bobby had looked at her the same way Sam now looked at Bobby, seeing as the Bobby Singer on this earth had died a while back as well. When Bobby had decided to let Mary and Jack stay, Evan had been furious. How dare Bobby let some kid with angel blood running through his veins stay, after all the angels had done to them? But then Jack started helping the rebels take down Michael’s forces, and Evan slowly grew less wary of him and more accustomed to having him around. Evan was pretty used to having Jack around now, which would make traveling and hunting with him easier. Still, every once and a while he would do something like heal someone who was critically injured or teleport away and back again and that uneasy feeling Evan had about him would return. It was a process, she supposed. 

The elevator clanged to a stop at long last--the ride from the main level of the bunker down to the armory had been longer than Evan had expected. She wasn’t overly enthused at the thought of how much earth there was above her- it reminded her of a time she would rather forget- but she pushed the thought aside and retrieved the ring of keys that Sam had given her from her jeans pocket. It took a few tries, but she finally managed to find the proper key to slide open the elevator’s metal grate, and then a second key unlocked the armory door. She let herself in and turned the lights on.

She almost lost her breath at the sight of the fully stocked armory. She had never seen a weapons hold so clean, organized, and complete. Her life as a Hunter had always been relatively chaotic--ragtag ops teams, rusty lockers of mix-matched rifles and sawed-off shotguns, fingerless gloves in place of brass knuckles, butcher knives instead of bowies. The number of options in front of her now was unfathomable in comparison.

Evan knew that she and Shiloh would likely favor their own, granted few, weapons brought from home, but she knew it was unwise to go on a hunt without backup supplies.

There were military grade weapons bags hung on the wall beside the lightswitch. She grabbed one, unzipped it, and started perusing the aisles, grabbing anything she knew for sure that either she or Shiloh could operate, and then other, more unfamiliar things just for fun. 

Evan knew to expect the monsters and demons of this world to be different from what they had been used to in their own dimension. That being said, she wasn’t completely sure how to prepare for the learning curve. There were still the basics--kill vampires by beheading, werewolves with silver, changelings with fire--but because the monsters back home had been so well-adapted to the apocalypse, she had little to no experience with monsters in more… preferable living conditions. The monsters in their world were unpredictable, driven to madness by starvation due to the lack of people on the planet. They were wild and easy to trick because they were too hungry to think things through. Granted, that also made them extremely dangerous. Once upon a time monsters were coherent enough to control themselves and occasionally be reasoned with, but after the apocalypse happened they couldn’t afford to care. Now they would stop at nothing to survive, and you were usually forced to kill them before they killed you. But Sam had told them that the monsters on this earth were much more well-mannered. He even said he and Dean were close friends with a werewolf. However, he had also said that the monsters here much more capable of blending in with the general population, and were smart enough to avoid most hunters. Evan imagined hunting on this earth would be less like hunting a wild animal and more like trying to catch a serial killer with supernatural abilities. 

As she thought this through, Evan plucked what looked like a hand grenade from the top drawer of a particularly durable weapon cabinet. With a small smirk, she tucked it safely into her bag.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update. This chapter is a monster. It’s also partially unedited because my co-author is super busy at school so sorry if some of the parts suck.

Evan strode into the garage, the bag on her shoulder now significantly heavier after raiding the armory. Obviously they were going to need some way to get around the country, and Sam had told them they could pick anything in the garage if they wanted, or just jack a car they found along the way. Anticipating the garage to be full of antiques, considering the Men of Letters hadn’t existed in over sixty years, Evan figured they would just steal a car along the way. But Sam had mentioned they had been stocking their garage over the last couple of years so she decided to take a look around.  
Evan’s eyes roamed around, taking in the rows of cars. The Winchesters’ black ‘67 Impala was parked in the spot closest to the door, probably so they could make a fast exit if they had to. Evan eyed the car with envy. It was a cool car, she had to admit. But she knew it was off limits. She could never take Dean’s Baby anyway. 

Otherwise, there was an array of muscle cars, old and new, none of which particularly excited her. She walked past a ‘79 Trans Am, a ‘70 Challenger, a Delorean she was sure Shiloh would have geeked out over--but she supposed she couldn’t be picky. She was about to just take a random pair of keys off the rack when she spotted a car tucked away in the corner. She stopped, frozen, hand outstretched to the keys, eyes wide. She couldn’t believe it. It couldn’t be. Almost instantly her mind flashed back to the last time she’d seen that car.

~~

Eight years earlier

Evan sat in the corner of her closet in eerie silence. A ten-year-old Shiloh sat curled against her, shaking. She was pretty sure they were both crying, but neither of them dared to make a sound. Evan let the tears silently slide down her cheeks, and pulled Shiloh tighter into her chest.

There had been a fight, that Evan was sure of. She and Shiloh had been in her room, Shiloh reading through their mom’s old hunter journal and Evan carefully examining the knife her father had given her. It was a Ka-Bar Army combat knife with a leather-washer handle and a seven-inch carbon steel clip point blade. A couple of months ago, if her dad had caught her with that knife, he would have freaked out and she would have been grounded for a week. But that was before the angels attacked. Now Evan clutched the knife in her hand, careful to keep the blade pointed away from Shiloh.

They had heard a loud noise come from the backyard, like a bomb going off. Declan had come running up to their room, his eyes panicked. He told them to hide in the closet and not make a sound. Evan had protested, wanting to know what was going on. But Declan had ignored her, shoving both of them into her closet and slamming the door. They both stood with their ears to the door, trying to hear what was going on. In the years to follow, Evan wanted nothing more than to forget what she had heard next.

Shouting. Then gunshots. A couple of them, actually. Then nothing for a short while. Evan almost thought it would be safe to go out when she heard it. The screaming. It rooted her to the spot and made icy panic shoot through her veins. She didn’t want to recognize the voice. But she did. It was her mother. She was pretty sure it only went on for a couple of minutes, but it felt like an eternity. Then it just stopped, and they were left in an uneasy silence. 

Evan was about to go out and see what had happened when suddenly she heard footsteps downstairs. They were heavier than her mom’s or Declan’s, and too careless to be her dad’s. Evan grabbed Shiloh and forced both of them into the corner of the closet, trying to become invisible behind the hanging clothes. She heard the footsteps climb the stairs and desperately tried to quiet her heavy breathing. The footsteps got closer and closer until she was sure they were in her room. They couldn't be more than five feet away from where she and her sister were hiding. Evan panicked and clutched the knife tightly in her hand, ready to fight whoever it was and protect her sister if she had to. But then, after what felt like a lifetime, she heard the footsteps leave the room. She heard them continue their search throughout the whole upstairs, opening and closing doors as they went. Evan didn’t loosen her hold on the knife until she heard them walk downstairs and leave the house. Then, once again, they were left in silence. 

Evan wasn’t sure if minutes or hours had passed with them hiding in the closet. The more time passed, the more worried she became. She couldn’t get the sound of her mom’s screaming out of her head. She kept telling herself not to worry. Their mom was tough, they both knew that. She was a hunter, she had experience killing monsters. She was probably fine. But Evan couldn't shake the feeling that something terrible had happened. It was the same feeling she had gotten a couple of months ago, when the world ended.

Evan remembered that day clearly. She and Shiloh had been home from school, playing out in the front yard, when the world was suddenly enveloped in darkness. Their mom came running out of the house, screaming for them to get inside. Evan had never seen her mother so scared, and she and Shiloh immediately abandoned their toys and sprinted to the house. Their mother ushered both of them down to the basement, where their father was already waiting for them. Evan slammed into her father, hugging him tightly. 

“It’s okay, we’re going to be okay,” her dad said, attempting to soothe her by running a hand over her hair.

“What’s going on?” Evan had asked, looking up at him with fearful eyes. Her dad didn’t answer, looking up at their mother instead. She was still at the top of the stairs, painting an intricate design on the door. Evan could hear the weather start to get worse, the wind howling outside. 

Their mom, apparently finished with whatever she had been doing, came down the stairs and pulled Evan and Shiloh close. “Do we have everything?” She asked their dad.

“Yup. Lanterns, blankets, food. We should be good for about a week,” he said.

“Mom, what is going on?” Evan asked again. 

Their mom knelt down and took each of their hands. “Honey, I’m so sorry this is happening,” she said. That’s when she told them everything. That monsters were real. That she had spent her entire life hunting them down and making sure they never hurt anyone. She told them that what was happening now was called the apocalypse, that it was caused by the archangels Michael and Lucifer fighting for control of pretty much everything. Evan shook her head the entire time, not wanting to believe a word her mom was saying. 

“I know this is a lot, and I know this is scary. I never wanted you girls to know any of this. But I’ve known that this could happen for a while. You’re father and I are prepared. As long as we stay down here, we’ll be safe,” her mom said. She nodded her head towards the door. “That symbol up there, it's angel warding. It’s like a magic symbol that prevents the angels from coming down here and finding us.” That made Evan feel a little bit better.

All in all, the apocalypse only lasted about four days. Evan and Shiloh had spent the entire time in the basement asking their mom every question they could think of about the supernatural world. And their mom had answered them all patiently and thoroughly, knowing there was no point in hiding the truth anymore. Every so often they would hear the wind howl or a deafening boom that would shake the ground. Evan worried that their house would collapse on them, but it never did. When they finally emerged from the basement, they found their house in shambles. Windows were broken in, and stuff was scattered everywhere. The sky had turned gray, and there was a hint of smoke in the air. Their mother took off shortly after, saying she was going to find Declan and find out the state of the rest of the world. It took her almost two weeks to return, with Declan and bad news in tow. She told them that Declan’s father was dead, as was much of the rest of the world. It seemed Michael had won the battle that destroyed so much of the earth, but he and the angels were now set on destroying what remained.

From that point on, Evan and Shiloh had been secluded to the house, which their mother had heavily warded. Their mother would disappear for days at a time, venturing out into the world to try and find, well, anyone really. It terrified Evan every time her mother left, not knowing if she would come back or not. But she always did. Their father had taken to teaching them how to fight, the basics to hand-to-hand combat he learned in the army. Evan spent a lot of time sparring with Declan in the basement. They had an agreement to never take it easy on each other and they both had the bruises to prove it. Their father had also started to teach them how to use different weapons. Never guns, they were too loud and they didn’t want to draw attention to themselves. But Evan had gotten fairly good at handling her father’s knife. Shiloh spent all of her spare time pouring over her mom’s old journal and the few books on lore their mother had stashed in the basement. She would sometimes sit in the basement while Evan and Declan sparred and call out different facts she thought were interesting.

Declan, for his part, remained fairly quiet and withdrawn the whole time. He rarely spoke to their father, and he never looked at him when he did so. He would talk to the girls occasionally, calling out pointers to Evan as they sparred or elaborating on something Shiloh had read. Declan knew more about hunting than they did. He acted like he had grown up in this life. Evan guessed his father was a hunter, but she didn’t ask him about it. He didn’t like talking about his father. Evan had heard Declan shouting at their mom a couple of times late at night. She tried not to eavesdrop, but she got the gist of it. She knew Declan was angry at their mother for not being there to save his father, and she knew he was only here because he had nowhere else to go.

Every so often their parents would come running into the house and usher them all into the basement. It meant that there were angels nearby, and they would all spend the next couple of days quietly hiding and hoping to whatever higher power there was left that the angels didn’t find them. They never did. At least, not until now. 

Finally, Evan nudged Shiloh from her shoulder and moved to get up. 

“What are you doing?” Shiloh whispered, eyes wide with fear.

“It’s too quiet. I’m going to go see what’s going on,” Evan said.

“Well I’m coming with you!”

Evan paused. She didn’t like the idea of bringing Shiloh with her. There was no telling what dangers were out there. But she didn’t like the idea of Shiloh being out of her sight either.

Eventually she relented, nodding towards the door as invitation. She could protect her sister if she was by her side. Evan clasped Shiloh’s hand tightly in her own and opened the door, just a crack, to looked around her bedroom. Seeing no danger, she slowly opened the door the rest of the way and and moved out into the center of the room. Turning around, she noticed there was a small, intricate symbol drawn on her closet door. She vaguely recognized it from her mom’s journal as having something to do with warding. It was probably the reason whoever it was didn’t bother looking in the closet. Declan must have drawn the symbol to keep them hidden.

Evan walked over to her window that overlooked the front yard, Shiloh sticking to her side like glue. There was nothing out there. Slowly, she and Shiloh made their way downstairs, peering around corners to search for any dangers as they went. Evan was starting to get more nervous. Their house was a mess. Doors were thrown open, stuff had been shoved aside and scattered on the ground. Whoever the intruder had been was looking for something. Probably them.

Evan clutched the knife tighter in her hand as they made their way towards the back of the house. Every second that passed in which Declan and their parents remained unseen made her increasingly uneasy. Finally, upon clearing the house, Evan made a move toward the back door. When she got there, she froze for a split-second, before roughly shoving Shiloh out of view of the backyard.

Shiloh pressed herself into the wall, eyes wide. “What is it?” She asked. But Evan couldn’t answer. She didn’t know how.

The backyard looked like a war zone. There were several large craters in the grass, some of them still smoldering from whatever had landed there. Their garage, which was separated from the rest of the house, had one wall completely blown in. Evan saw the glint of bullet casings scattered around in the grass. 

“Stay here,” Evan said to Shiloh.  
“Ev are you kidding me? I’m not a child--” Shiloh started, grabbing at her hand, but Evan turned on her.

“Shiloh, wait one goddamn minute!” she whispered harshly before shaking off her sister’s grip.

Evan walked out of the house and continued to look around. There were a couple of images of angel wings burned into the ground. Evan knew those marks appeared when an angel was killed. Okay, so it was angels that attacked, she thought. But how did they find them? Evan glanced back at the house and saw scorch marks of intricate symbols covering the outside. The warding had been burned away. She knew it took a lot of angelic power to do that. But it's okay, the markings of the wings, that meant that their parents had killed the angels, right? But Evan knew what she had seen when she had first looked out into the yard, and it made her stomach drop.

Evan looked around at the three figures lying on the ground, motionless. She noticed her father first, as he was closest to the house. His body looked as if it had just been dropped in a pile on the ground. He had cuts and bruises on his arms and face, and his eye sockets were charred and empty, as if his eyes has been burned out of his head. Evan quickly looked away before she could see any more, but she knew she had seen enough to haunt her for the next several years. She turned her attention to the other two figures. She saw her mother’s body laying on her back in the grass. She had some cuts and bruises too, but not as many, and the front of her shirt was soaked through with blood. The practical part of Evan’s brain that was still functioning put the pieces together quickly. 

There was a fight. Mom and Dad took out a couple of angels, but then the angels got an upper hand on them. They probably tortured Dad to get mom to talk, trying to find out if there were any other humans here. The angels killed them when they wouldn’t give us up, Evan thought. She felt her heart drop into her stomach. They died to protect us.  
Evan let her eyes roam over to the third figure, and felt the weight on her chest lift a little. It was Declan. Alive. Declan was alive.

Evan slowly approached Declan, doing her best not to look too closely at anything else around her. Her brother was completely still, his head hanging, hands bloody and limp in his lap--otherwise, he looked unharmed. His hair and clothes were disheveled. As he heard her approaching, he slowly looked up. His eyes were red, and their were tear tracks cutting through the dirt on his cheeks.

“Declan,” Evan said, her voice small. She didn’t know what to say.

“Mom told me to hide in the cabinet in the garage. I didn’t want to but… I saw everything. I couldn’t-” he started, choking on his words. He sniffled a little, then took a deep breath. “There wasn’t anything I could do,” he said, his voice void of any emotion.

Evan dropped the knife in the grass and fell to her knees next to her mother. She reached hesitantly for her hand, heavy and lifeless, and clasped it in her own. She felt tears running down her own face. She wasn’t sure when she had even started crying, like it mattered. She felt every ounce of strength leave her body as she completely broke down, sobbing next to her mother’s body.

Having been told that the monsters under her bed were real a couple of months ago, Evan had known the reality of their lives were going to change drastically. Her parents had told her how cruel the world of the supernatural could be, and that it was now their responsibility to look after anyone that needed help in this post-apocalyptic nightmare. Gone were the days of family picnics and Christmas mornings. Gone were Shiloh’s childhood dreams of getting into an Ivy League school. They knew there was only pain and suffering ahead of them, and as Evan sat next to her mother’s lifeless body, she felt the weight of that realization set in. Evan watched as glimpses of memories flashed before her eyes. Family vacations to Universal Studios. Helping their parents plant new flowers in the front yard every spring. Playing card games by candlelight during power-outages. Making s’mores by the fire on camping trips. While there were some family disagreements here or there, they all loved each other unconditionally. They were as close as a family could be.

And now, fourteen-year-old Evan Wilkinson reached forward and closed her dead mother’s eyes. 

After a while, the tears stopped coming. Evan had nothing left. She was finally shaken out of her grieving by Declan standing up. 

“We can't stay here,” Declan said.

“We can't just leave them here,” Evan said in a pathetically small voice.

“We won't,” he said, “But we can’t sit here forever. They’ll come back. Where is Shiloh?”

Evan’s head snapped up. In her moment of grief, she had forgotten that she had left Shiloh in the house. She hoped to whatever God there may still be that she had stayed where Evan had left her.

She grabbed the knife, it suddenly being much more significant to her, and ran back to the house, Declan close behind her. When she got there, she found Shiloh crouched by the backdoor. Her knees were hugged to her chest, and there were tears in her eyes.

“They’re gone, aren’t they?” She asked.

Evan didn’t answer. Instead, she crouched down next to her sister and pulled her into a hug. She could feel Shiloh shaking as she cried, and it made Evan just hug her tighter. Evan could sense Declan standing behind them, unsure of what to do. Hesitantly, he knelt down next to them and put a hand on each of their shoulders. 

“We have to get moving,” he said, “It’s dangerous for us to stay here.”

“Where are we supposed to go? Who-” Evan’s words caught in her throat. Who did they have left?

“I know a place,” Declan said with a look in his eyes. Mom told him what to do if this happened, Evan realized. “Go and grab your things,” he said.

“But-” Evan started.

“I’ll take care of it,” Declan said, finishing her thought for her. Evan didn’t know what Declan was going to do about their parents, but she was too exhausted to ask.  
As Declan walked out the back door, Evan slowly stood up, dragging Shiloh with her. She placed a hand on Shiloh’s back as she walked them towards the stairs, hoping Shiloh wouldn’t try and turn around. They walked upstairs and into their rooms to pack their things.

Evan paused in her doorway and looked around her room for what she imagined would be the last time. Her room. The room she had grown up in. Evan sighed, feeling defeated and shocked, and went to grab her duffel bag out of her closet. She only packed the essentials, T-shirts, jeans, jackets, her good pair of boots. She didn’t bother packing any of her dresses or holiday pajamas. There would be no need for them wherever they were going. Evan grabbed the leather sheath for her father’s knife off of her bedside table, slid the knife in, and threw it in her bag, glad to no longer have to carry it around. She took one last look around the room, zipped up her bag and closed the door behind her. Then she made her way down the hall to their parents’ room.

Evan had always thought her parents had the coziest room, but it seemed strangely cold now. She walked over to her parents dresser and grabbed her mother’s jewelry box, stuffing it in the side pocket of her bag. It was filled with various pieces of jewelry their father had gotten their mother. Jewelry was always his go-to gift for her. Evan knew they would probably have to pawn all of it off at some point for money, but she wanted to take some time to go through it first. Not now though. Too soon.  
She walked into her parent’s closet and grabbed their father’s old army jacket off of its hanger. Evan knew it would never fit her, but she wanted it anyway. While she was thinking about it, she grabbed their mother’s signature leather jacket as well. Their dad had gotten it for their mom a year before Evan was born, and the first day of every autumn that was below sixty degrees, she was wearing it. Evan hugged it close to her for a moment. It still smelled like her, like coffee and cedarwood. She stuffed it under her arm as well.

Evan was about to leave when she noticed something brightly colored off in the corner, hiding behind a pair of her dad’s boots. She pushed the shoes aside and grabbed the three packages sitting there, all wrapped in identical wrapping paper. Each one had a tag, with Declan, Evan, and Shiloh’s names on them. Evan smiled to herself. Her parents always bought presents for them throughout the year and hid them in their closet until Christmas. Evan had found out about their hiding spot years ago during a game of hide-and-seek with Shiloh, but she loved the surprise of Christmas, so she never opened any of the presents. Evan’s felt her smile falter. They would never have another Christmas with their parents again.

Evan quickly grabbed the small packages and left, slamming the door behind her. She threw the packages in her bag and zipped it up, now considerably heavier. Then she walked over to Shiloh’s room. She found Shiloh sitting on her bed, her backpack sitting next to her. She had their mom’s journal open in her lap, her fingers flipping deftly through the pages. An Uncle Henry fixed blade was sheathed on top of her bag.

“Hey, all packed?” Evan asked, eying the knife, trying to keep the dread out of her voice. 

“Yeah,” Shiloh answered shortly. Evan wanted to say something to comfort her, but nothing came to mind. Besides, she knew nothing she said would help. Not now, anyway. 

“Alright. Let's go,” Evan said. She closed Shiloh’s door behind them as they left, and they made their way downstairs. Evan noticed Declan’s bag, which had been next to the couch where he had been sleeping for the past couple of months, was gone. He must have come in at some point and grabbed it. As they made their way towards the back of the house, Evan pushed ahead of Shiloh to check the backyard. But Declan had taken care of it, as he said he would. Instead of seeing her parents mutilated bodies discarded in the yard, she only saw a sheet covering two vaguely shaped objects. Declan must have moved their father over by their mother and wrapped them. Evan winced when she noticed some blood had started to soak through the sheet.

“You ready?” Evan asked Shiloh, putting a hand on her shoulder.

Shiloh swallowed. “Yeah,” she said, looking broken but determined. 

They walked through the yard, stopping a few feet away from their parents covered bodies. Evan glanced around. Where was Declan?

As if sensing her thoughts, Declan walked out of the half-destroyed garage, a container of some sort in his hand. “I didn’t want to start without you guys,” he said.

“Start with what?” Shiloh asked.

Declan took a deep breath, not meeting their eyes. “We don’t have time do build a whole pyre, but I thought they still deserved a Hunter’s funeral,” he said.

Evan knew that there was a tradition of salting and burning the bodies of dead hunters to make sure they didn’t come back as ghosts. She never thought she would have to do it to her own parents. 

She watched as Declan tossed salt over the sheets, followed by a spattering of lighter fluid from the shed, the smell graciously burning their noses while he ceremoniously threw a pack of lit matches on top, saving them from the smell of burning flesh. The three siblings stood, quiet and solemn, watching the flames grow for an immeasurable amount of time.

“We should get going,” Declan said finally.

“How are we going to get out of here?” Evan asked, glancing at the garage. The part of it that collapsed had completely totaled their family car. 

“You guys own more than one car, ya know,” Declan said, following her train of thought. He started walking towards the garage, and Evan and Shiloh followed him, curious. They only ever went anywhere in the family car--what else was there?

As they walked past the part of their garage that had been reduced to rubble, Evan suddenly realized what Declan was talking about. The half of their garage that hadn’t been destroyed had housed a second car their father kept covered. Declan gave the sheet a pull, revealing a maroon 1965 Ford Mustang. Evan felt foolish for not thinking of it sooner.

The car was their dad’s. He had bought it right after he retired from active duty, and it was his most prized possession. Their dad used to tell them that he bought it to impress their mom, who he had just started dating at the time. Their mom had always loved that car. Evan could vaguely remember riding in it when she was younger, but she hadn’t been in it in a long time. It wasn’t the safest car in the world due to its age (it didn’t even have airbags), so shortly after Shiloh was born their parents bought their family car and they pretty much drove that everywhere. However, recently, as Evan was getting closer to driving-age, she had begun asking her father if she could have the car once she got her license. He had said no outright, claiming that he wanted to get her a safer, newer car. But Evan only had eyes for that car, and hoped one day she would be able to wear her dad down enough to let her drive it. Their dad still drove it around occasionally, and he had often had Evan help him with repairs on it. Evan felt her heart break for what felt like the millionth time that day. This car was their dad’s, and he would never be behind it’s wheel again. 

Declan popped the trunk and threw his bag inside, and Evan and Shiloh followed suit. He then led them over to the utility cabinet and, rather shockingly, withdrew a handgun from under his shirttail, aimed it at the padlock on the door handles, and shot it clean through. Ears ringing, Evan and Shiloh watched as Declan pulled the chain from the handle and swung the doors open, revealing a small but well-stocked armory. Declan grabbed two boxes of hollow-points, stuffed them in his jacket pocket, and proceeded to pass guns and blades along to Shiloh, who passed them to Evan. Evan numbly placed them in the trunk of the car, subconsciously taking inventory: six bowies, three machetes, two sawed-off shotguns (illegal? She thought so, but she also supposed laws weren’t a top priority at the moment), boxes upon boxes of bullets, vials of what looked like water, others that looked like blood, an array of charms and talismans, a grocery bag of spray paint cans… it went on and on.

Finally, the weapons stopped coming. The girls watched as Declan grabbed a dusty keychain off a hook on the inside of the gun cabinet, walked around to close the trunk of the Mustang, and slid behind the wheel. “You coming or not?” Declan said, inserting the key into the ignition. The engine stuttered for a moment from disuse, but settled into a comfortable pur. Evan let Shiloh into the back seat and then took shotgun herself.

It was weird seeing Declan behind the wheel, since Evan had only ever seen her dad there before. It felt wrong in a way, especially because Declan wasn’t related to their dad at all. Evan thought it should be her behind the wheel. But her dad had only let her practice driving it a couple of times, and that was only to teach her how to drive a stick, so Evan knew Declan would never agree to let her drive. Besides, it wasn’t like she knew where they were going anyway.

They pulled out of the garage and backed out towards the road. Evan looked down at her father’s knife she was holding in her lap. She supposed it was her knife now. She pushed back the tears she felt begin to form in her eyes. No, she couldn’t cry now. She had to be strong for Shiloh. Leaving their house, their home, the place they grew up in, wasn’t going to be easy for them. But they couldn’t stay. As Declan reached the road, Evan took one last look at their house before Declan shifted the car into gear and they took off.

~~

Present Day

Evan walked over to the corner of the garage, approaching the car slowly. She ran her hand over the hood as she walked around it, still caught up in her memories. She never thought she would see this car again. Theirs had lasted six long years before it had been destroyed in a rather brutal battle with the angels in Detroit. Losing that car after it had been like their second home for so long had broken Evan’s heart. Even though it was just a car, Evan had still grieved for a few days after like she had lost a loved one. Which, if you asked her, she had. They had been taught not to get attached to any belongings in their world, for they had to be prepared to leave everything behind and run at a moments notice. But Evan had worked her ass off to keep that car with her as long as possible.

The car was a bit different than her own. It was black, rather than the old charismatic maroon. It didn’t have the angel warding skillfully painted onto the roof, or the lace hex bag that had housed their parents’ wedding bands hanging from the mirror. It didn’t have the dent in the side from where Evan had been forcefully thrown into it by a vampire, or the scratches on the leather seats from when they had transported a werewolf. But the essence of the car was the same. It reminded her of how they had first found her car in their half-destroyed garage all those years ago. 

Evan opened the driver’s side door and slid behind the wheel. She brushed her hands over the wheel and rested her feet on the petals. She leaned over to check inside the glove box, but the car was completely cleaned out. Brand new. To her at least.

Evan was snapped out of her haze by the sound of Shiloh and Jack walking into the garage. She shook her head as if to clear it and got out of the car. 

“There you guys are,” Evan said.

“Yeah, we-” Shiloh started, but cut off when she saw the car Evan was leaning against. “Holy shit, is that…?” She trailed off.

“Yup,” Evan said, smiling smugly.

Shiloh dropped her bag on the ground and ran up to the car, eyes scanning every inch of it. “How…?” She asked.

“Sam and Dean must have stolen it at some point,” Evan said, shrugging.

“I never thought I’d see one again,” Shiloh said, her voice soft in disbelief. 

Jack looked between the two of them. “I don’t understand. What’s so special about this car?” Jack asked.

“We used to have one just like it back home. Before it was destroyed,” Evan explained, “A car just like this saved our lives more times than we can count.” Jack nodded in understanding.

“Please tell me we’re taking this car,” Shiloh said. 

“What do you think?” Evan asked, holding up the keys.

“Yes!” Shiloh said, lunging for the keys. Evan pulled them away before she could grab them.

“No way, kid. I’m driving,” Evan said.

“Oh come on, you always got to drive back home,” Shiloh argued.

“I’m the oldest, I saw the car first, I’m driving,” Evan said. No way she was going to pass up a chance to drive a car like this after it had been so long.

“Fine,” Shiloh said, rolling her eyes affectionately. 

They all threw their bags in the trunk and climbed into the car, with Shiloh riding shotgun and Jack sitting behind her. Evan put the keys in the ignition and started the engine. She closed her eyes, savoring the sound of the engine roaring to life. For a moment, it was like she was back home again. She opened her eyes again, shaking her head to clear it, and looked over at Shiloh. 

“You ready?” She asked. 

Shiloh nodded. “Let’s do this,” she said.

Evan smiled. She shifted the car into gear, had one last look around, and raced out of the garage.


End file.
